Corey Griggs is an entrepreneur in Nashville, Tennessee who moved from sales to financial planning after taking the Nashville Software School coding camp. While he initially hoped to get into music, he realized his true passion was working for small companies. Corey’s technical knowledge makes him both an excellent Sauce Labs and Directly expert.

Corey became a Sauce Labs expert in March 2014, and he’s answered 507 questions. Sauce Labs makes cloud-based software for testing mobile and web apps, and understanding the system requires technical chops. Corey has those chops. He describes his role as “helping people troubleshoot issues so that their tests run smoothly.” When we asked him why he enjoys it, he explained being “a big fan of learning” makes being a Sauce Labs expert “super exciting”.

Corey’s advice is to rehumanize the experience of technology. While Directly already “puts people that have knowledge of a specific business domain in a place where they can answer questions,” it is the “human touch that is really important in making someone feel welcome.” In his own words: “It’s always nice when there’s somebody banging their head against the wall… and you’re able to find the solution for them.”

How does he make people happy? He “leaves the Directly app running on the background in [his] phone” so that he answers questions quickly. He puts himself “in their headspace” so that he can “provide empathy for the issues they’re experiencing.” Making customers feel like they aren’t alone can be as useful as actually providing the answer; ”the fact that you’re trying is always helpful.” Corey reminds us that “customer service isn’t just confined to a discipline of customer service.” Sometime the best help can come from the community.